Labour has proved yet again that it hates employers/business.

[Batmanisaplaceinturkey]

Don't be surprised when your local pubs, restaurants, hairdressers etc close up shop.
Don't be surprised if your employer can't fund your next payrise, because their NI bill has increased. Workers will indirectly pay for these increases; employers don't have magic money trees.
I work for an employer that has charitable status. We work to improve the lives of others but now have to look at reducing headcount. Employers are not all fat cats driving Mercs.
BTW, I hate the Tories. This post does not make me a Tory before anyone starts that one.

That doesn’t explain your typical ‘HQ’ post which someone has to do on every thread.

If you read threads and not go for the usual lazy attack you’ll see stress about this.

I think there is a lot of panic from business owners right now, but I’m pretty sure they weren’t happy about the NMW when it was introduced and claimed they would never be able to afford the increase. Wondering how many businesses closed up as a direct result?

It’s schools that will potentially be hit hardest and I’m surprised they haven’t been excluded from the NI rise unless I missed that? But they may get money with one hand from the government and pay it back with another…

Are you worried about your "business" or all businesses?
How big is the business you work for (Charity)?

Labour don't hate, Conservatives don't hate. They have different priorities and see things in different lights

Starmer really can’t win on mn can he? On one hand he’s a bland Tory-lite sell-out. On the other he’s a Trotskyite commie.

I must say I smiled at the Trotskyite comments It’s been decades since I heard that used. Though still by people who don’t know what it actually means.

Im very glad I’m not still being judged on decisions I made when I was in my early 20s.

True. However it will affect individuals who do contract/freelance work. Since the introduction of IR35 entire business sectors have stopped putting freelancers/contractors on their payroll and insist on them working via an umbrella company intermediary. Contractors who work via an umbrella have to pay the employer NI contribution themselves.

So all sorts of people like supply teachers and IT contractors will see their personal taxes go up.

https://x.com/MartinSLewis/status/1851620885221773706

A business model who relies on making profit out of paying staff a pittance is not a sustainable one.

Yep, mine is bragging about its increased profits, all from cutting staff and making those left to do 3 people’s work.

I founded, ran and sold a business.

I am certainly a socialist.

I of course voted Labour.

I'm not at all surprised by the budget.

I think it's pretty good actually.

But as I sit here, retired, in my big house that I can't afford to heat, I think an opportunity was missed to really whack up inheritance tax.

If a small business owner can’t afford to pay a living wage, their business is not viable.

Actually crazy people think that was a commie budget its not even that socialist.

I was planning on taking on my first employee but that now won't be happening.

It will cost me more than I can afford and the other new rights coming in make it a risk I'd be crazy to take.

A business does not exist without making a profit! The whole aim of a business is to make money. It has to pay to be worth the risk. Why bother if you don’t get anything for taking the risk and employing people? It’s how all business should work. We have millions of people depending on businesses large and small. If business is clobbered there will be many not expanding or even contracting. Growth comes from business. Not the state. The state uses other people’s money. Business generates that money.

Labour is not business friendly. They expect and fund the state to boom and they offer huge pensions, which business and business employees pay for, yet the business owners are now not able to transfer pension assets to family members. These are assets with no state contribution. It really feels like war on business if the business owner is self employed and employs people. It’s clearly anti business.

Also the voting public voted for Brexit. Complete idiots of course but it’s what the majority wanted. Clearly was not in the interests of most employers but we have a nation that sticks two fingers up to common sense.

I listened to an interesting piece on the UK and what we do well and what we could do better. We are very good an ingenuity apparently, and start ups

What we are not as good as some other countries at is scaling up. They then went through some of the tax incentives that provide that environment

Labour seem to be committed to creating the opposite environment, which seems like madness at this point

"I get it, you're panicking and now have realised what you've done to yourself by electing a man who obvious, clear and lifelong communist sympathies."

Starmer is nowhere near left wing. He's Tory light.

we are continuing as taxpayers to subsidise businesses via UC so they can continue to pay shit wages.

My heart bleeds...

Ok but are you employed?

I'm a provider and several of my colleagues have already decided to close. They were already on the edge with the new funding, but they just can't afford to battle through yet more costs.

You would’ve always been crazy to take on an employee if you couldn’t cope with a 1.2% difference in their salary. Your business could never afford it in the first place.

I think the budget is short sighted - ok so they have said they want to protect working people they appear to have done this superficially but they haven't. Employers especially the smaller and medium size businesses face minimum wage increases about £7 per day per employee, plus NI costs - over a month and year this is a large for these type of businesses. They may well reduce the number of people they employee - or perhaps seek to employee younger workers who have a lover NMW or perhaps introduce technology or find other ways of reducing wage costs.

This has tickled me. Sorry I ended up in ER with my baby today and god knows why I said husband's 😂😂. I have 1 husband. Definitely one. I'll get some sleep!

It's the small family farms that I feel for. Often too small or in the wrong location to be farmed viably by the big farming companies, who will buy them when they get sold to pay IHT? The developers must be rubbing their hands in glee.

That is the least of it. It's just tipped the balance.

It's not worth being a micro employer nowadays. The new employment rights coming in are just too risky. I can't afford to pay someone if they are not helping me bring in at least as much business revenue as they cost me to employ. If they go off sick, claim paternity leave, carers leave and goodness knows what else whilst wanting to work from home a few days a week, it's simply not going to be worth it.

Didn't everyone say the UK would be bankrupted by the introduction of the NMW? The world will continue to turn for the vast majority, as it did back then. Not even the markets are spooked. Money has to come from somewhere. The cost of living crisis has meant people spending less on the services provided by businesses. It won't be the doom and gloom armchair financiers are predicting and it's a far cry from the disastrous budget everyone thought it would be.

You are talking rubbish OP.
After 14 years of total mis-management by a supposedly pro-business party drastic steps were called for.
I think it is a very good Budget in the circumstances and far better that I was expecting.
If your employer is both a charity and having to look at reducing its staff on account of the Budget changes, my first thought was how financially viable is it anyway?

It’s really not worth it - but your tone seems to indicate the country is worse off for your lack of employing one person. In the circumstances you’d describe, it’s really, really better off all round that you stick to being a one person band.

It was never a realistic idea, and the country isn’t so desperate for new jobs that they need businesses who aren’t financially sustainable employing people.

That’s a relief!

Sometimes even one husband is hard enough to deal with!